


Vows Made In Wine

by queenofthorns



Series: Brave New World [3]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-06-14
Packaged: 2017-12-15 00:00:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/842939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofthorns/pseuds/queenofthorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brienne and Jaime trace the first clue in their search for Arya; Brienne meets Jaime's brother Tyrion.</p><p>Spoilers through Episode 3.10 of the show, though the whole thing has now diverged wildly from actual canon. If you've read the books, you may recognize a line or two that I've stolen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vows Made In Wine

“Find Arya Stark?” Brienne asks. “She is your sister’s hostage.”

“No,” Jaime says. “All this time, Cersei only had one of the Stark girls. Arya slipped through her fingers at the beginning.” 

“So it’s hopeless.” She cannot suppress the quaver in her voice. 

“Not entirely,” Jaime says. “They... searched the bodies of Ned Stark’s men. Afterwards. Arya Stark wasn’t among them. It is likely she escaped into the city.”

There is no comfort in his surmise. War has raised up a thousand monsters in Westeros. _Jaime and I were both armed when we met one of them._ How could a gently-reared girl survive in their midst for over a year? 

Brienne imagines all that could have befallen Arya Stark, and her stomach heaves. She fumbles with her helm, heedless of a stray curl that catches in the eyesocket as she wrenches the thing from her head. She will seek temporary refuge inside her room, put off these clothes and this armor and this quest, go home to her father, and try to live with the knowledge that she has failed those who put their trust in her. The helm falls with a clang and her fingers close over the cold bronze handle of her door. 

Jaime’s hand comes down hers, tugging her gently toward him. “Brienne,” he pleads, his voice low and earnest. “I know our chances of finding her are as meager as my current skill with a sword, but ... we must try, or be forsworn.”

Brienne turns and looks into his eyes; there is no falsehood there, she would stake her life on it. _I already staked my life on him, though I did not know it at the time._ She breathes deep, banishing her doubts to the shadows where they belong, and nods. 

“Good. I think we should begin with Sansa Stark; she may know of something or someone who might have helped her sister,” Jaime says. “From what I saw, Arya’s a little hellcat, but resourceful. On our way to King’s Landing from Winterfell, she hid for four days in the woods near the Kingsroad, though hundreds of men were searching for her.” 

“What did they want with her?” Brienne asks, frowning. 

“She attacked Joffrey,” Jaime says. “Or so Cersei told Robert.” He shakes his head. “My sweet sister even had me out looking for the girl, with orders to take her hand for striking the Crown Prince.”

Brienne’s eyes widen in horror; she pulls her hand from Jaime’s grasp. Arya was - _is_ \- a child. _Jaime crippled a child younger than her._ He admitted as much to Lady Catelyn. 

“Would you have done it?” she demands. Intentions are not the same as deeds; if they were, Lady Catelyn and Renly would still number among the living. _I swore I would protect them, I meant every word, and yet they died, despite my intentions._

“For once, the gods were good; they spared me that choice. Ned Stark’s men found her first.” His lips twist into the blade-sharp smile Brienne remembers from their first days together, but his mockery is not for her. “And here I am, still searching for Arya Stark. Only I’m the one who lost his hand. Some men might call it justice.” 

“Do you?” Brienne asks. 

His eyes meet hers, as hard and bright as emeralds, and utterly devoid of mercy. “Yes.”

Locke and his men might have taken Jaime’s head and called it just recompense for his crimes; instead, they maimed him and mocked his suffering, like spiteful children prodding a wounded lion through the bars of its cage. 

“Cruelty is not justice,” she says. 

Jaime’s lips part, but he says nothing. They stand, gazes locked, until the sound of approaching footsteps breaks them apart. Brienne lunges for the helm and fits it over her head just as a real Lannister guardsman rounds the corner.

“Ser Jaime.” The guardsman salutes and then glances curiously at Brienne.

Jaime steps between Brienne and the guardsman. “I fear I have forgotten the directions my brother gave me,” he says, “and this big ... plank here doesn’t seem to know right from left.” Brienne narrows her eyes, hoping Jaime can feel the glare she is aiming between his shoulder blades. He is enjoying this far more than he should. “Can you show us to Tyrion’s chambers?”

***

Jaime keeps the guardsman by his side, while Brienne brings up the rear. He engages the man in talk about his commander, his battles, his home, his new bride, the fat trout he caught in the Tumblestone near Ashemark. By the time they have reached Tyrion’s rooms, the man has forgotten any questions he meant to ask about the stranger in Lannister armor; instead he looks fair set to name his firstborn after Jaime. 

“My thanks,” Jaime says, when the guardsman points them down the last short corridor. “Give my regards to Ser Addam! When I am next in the Westerlands, you must show me that trout stream.”

“I’ll do that, ser,” the man says, smiling to himself as he walks past Brienne without a backward glance.

Behind him, Jaime winks at Brienne. _He has the same gift Renly did; when he chooses he can make men love him._ It is a dangerous gift: men will follow and fight for lords whom they fear, but they will die, and willingly, for lords whom they love. 

Jaime raps on the door of Tyrion’s chambers. A muffled cry of “Go away!” sounds from within, but Jaime ignores it, pounding at the door with his fist. Brienne feels her heart thud in the same rhythm. What will she say to Sansa Stark when she meets her? Lady Catelyn released Jaime for the sake of her daughters, and let herself be called traitor to her son. All to no avail: Lady Catelyn is dead; Brienne and Jaime came too late to save Sansa from her marriage; and the search for Arya may prove a fool's errand. _A fitting name, for I have been called fool often enough._

There is a long pause before a serving maid cracks open the door. She is slender, disheveled, and strikingly pretty under her ferocious scowl.

“Yes?” 

Jaime raises his voice: “Tyrion! I must speak with you.”

“Let him in, Shae!” someone calls from inside. 

 Shae shrugs, and opens the door wide so they can pass through. A small man sits at a round table that bears the remains of a lavish repast and an enormous golden flagon decorated with an ornate lion’s head. It is long past noon, but Tyrion Lannister is still clad in a nightshirt, his hair in irregular spikes around his head as though he’s only just risen.

“Allow me to introduce my brother,” Tyrion says with the overly precise diction of a man who is well into his cups. “Ser Jaime Lannister, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. Jaime, this is Shae, my wife’s lady’s maid.” 

Jaime nods his head in acknowledgment, though it is passing odd for Tyrion to introduce a serving maid to his brother. Shae turns her scowl on Tyrion, who shrugs and pours himself more wine. 

“And what brings you to see me at the break of dawn?” Tyrion asks, as Shae clears the table with an exaggerated clatter of plates. 

“Dawn is a distant memory, little brother,” Jaime says. “And it’s your lady wife we’ve come to see.”

“You wound me,” Tyrion replies, raising his wine cup. “I thought you’d come to toast our reunion. Here’s to Handless and Noseless, the Lannister brothers.”

Jaime flinches at that, but his voice is level when he replies. “A slight exaggeration in your case, would you not say?” Although a long red puckered scar runs across the bridge of Tyrion’s nose and down one cheek, he would be reckoned a handsome man by any who cared to look past his small stature. The gods dealt out beauty with a profligate hand to Tywin Lannister’s children.

“No thanks to your Kingsguard brother, Ser Mandon Moore,” Tyrion says. 

“What?”

“During the battle,” Tyrion explains. “Blackwater. To be fair, he was trying to take my head off, not just my nose. If it weren’t for my squire Pod, our father would only have one imperfect son, not two.”

“Mandon Moore would not have acted on his own. ”

“Of course not,” Tyrion says. “Our sweet sister gave him his orders.”

An icy finger runs up Brienne's spine. The Queen was proud and cruel and cold to her yesterday, but to slay her own brother would be a crime past forgiveness by gods and men alike. Is she truly capable of such a thing?

Jaime sits heavily in a chair opposite Tyrion. “Cersei," he breathes, her name a caress on his lips. He shakes his head. “No. There must be some mistake; I cannot believe that of her.”

“It’s true what they say; the eyes of love are blind,” Tyrion says, harsh as metal grinding on stone. “Believe what you will, brother. There is much you do not know about Cersei.”

“Do you have any proof?” 

“She’s hated me since the day I was born. As has our father.”

Jaime’s left hand clenches. “I did what I could,” he says softly. “Though it was not much.”

 _No wonder his memories of Casterly Rock are so bitter_ , Brienne thinks. To be the one who loved them all, and to know they all hated each other; perhaps the gods have not been so kind to the Lannisters after all.

Tyrion gives his brother an unexpectedly sweet smile. “I know. Forgive me for my bitterness; I have been too long amongst our family without you to protect me.” He pours a cup of wine and pushes it across the table to Jaime.”And I am truly sorry for your loss.” 

Jaime nods his acknowledgment of Tyrion’s apology and raises the cup to his lips. After he swallows, he sets it down carefully. “I had hoped to find you happier in your marriage, little brother,” he says.

“Ah, yes, my marriage. You’ve come to see my wife, if I remember.” Tyrion glances over to the alcove that serves as a bedroom, where Shae is now pummeling pillows with a vigor that makes Brienne fear they will burst. “Shae,” Tyrion says. “Where is Sansa?”

“Lady Sansa is in the Maidenvault with Margaery Tyrell,” Shae says. 

“Will you be a dear and ask her to return?” Tyrion says in a tone just short of wheedling. “My brother is anxious to meet his good-sister.”

When she has gone, with a bang of the door for good measure, Jaime rounds on his brother. “You’ve not been married a month, and she is your wife’s _maid_.”

“She was mine long before she was Sansa’s,” Tyrion replies. 

“I’m not sure that makes it better,” Jaime says. “Your wife and your mistress together...”

“Shae loves me, and I love her.” 

“Yet you married Sansa Stark,” Jaime points out. 

“The marriage was not of my making.”

“Father,” Jaime says. It’s a statement, not a question.

“Father is a hard man to refuse,” Tyrion agrees. “Do you remember what happened last time I defied him?”

Jaime takes a deep breath, and squares his shoulders, readying himself to march into battle. “Tyrion ---”

“I haven’t laid a finger on the girl.” Tyrion pours himself another cup of wine. “Though Father insists I provide him with an heir to Winterfell. It’s enough to drive a man to drink.” He takes a deep draught. “Why don’t you take that helm off and sit down, Lady Brienne? Then both of you can tell me what you want with Sansa.”

Brienne is startled enough to comply immediately, and Jaime laughs. “How did you know?” he asks.

“I didn’t until this moment.” Tyrion says. “I only suspected.”

“How?” Brienne asks. If her disguise is so easily pierced, the search for Arya Stark will be that much more difficult.

“For the same reasons Jaime realized Shae was my ... not just a maid. You are far better at disguising your feelings, my lady, than Shae, but then again, my talent for skullduggery outstrips Jaime's.” 

He ticks off a list on his fingers. “One: you’re taller than anyone else in my father’s guard or Cersei’s. And I know of no new Lannister armies in the city, so you must be a stranger wearing Lannister armor for some reason.” He glances at Jaime. “Though now the Riverlands have been _pacified_ , Gregor Clegane and his men are due back for Joffrey’s wedding. I suppose Father thinks we need some more of our men to balance out all the Tyrells.”

Tyrion ignores Jaime’s frown at that news and continues: “Two: I doubted Jaime would speak so freely in front of an ordinary guardsman, so you must be a friend. And from the way my brother defended you to the Small Council yesterday, I know he considers you a friend. A friend who needed a disguise. It could only be you. It was not so difficult to decipher this riddle. For me.” He waves his hand, as though acknowledging the applause of an invisible audience. “You needn't worry too much, Lady Brienne. Most people are not as observant as I am.”

“Ser Jaime defended me?” Brienne asks.

“Yes,” Tyrion says. “Did you not know? Our father was very wroth about Jaime’s hand, and I fear he blamed you and Catelyn Stark for that.”

“Lady Catelyn had nothing to do with it,” Brienne says hotly. “It was Roose Bolton’s men who hurt him.” 

“Oh, yes,” Tyrion continues. “So Jaime told us, repeatedly. But my father can hardly turn against his new ally and Warden of the North, can he? A Lannister always pays his debts, don’t forget, and your island is small and of little importance to my father’s plans. I fear you might have slept in the dungeons, my lady, had Jaime not insisted that you’d saved his life.” 

_He saved mine too._ She glances at Jaime, who is uncharacteristically silent.

Tyrion favors Brienne with one of his warm smiles, and she smiles back without thinking. “You might not know it from my earlier rudeness, but ... I am quite fond of my brother. And I am deeply grateful you brought him back to us alive.”

“I think I prefer you rude to maudlin,” Jaime comments.

Tyrion snorts. “And now, tell me, what is it that you want with my wife?”

“We’re looking for her sister, Arya,” Brienne says.

“When Lady Catelyn released me,” Jaime says, “she made me promise to return her daughters to her. I swore her a vow.”

Tyrion’s eyes widen. “You swore a vow?” To Brienne’s surprise and chagrin, he starts to laugh. “And you actually mean to keep it?”


End file.
